Jack Francis

[Challenger]

Planet Manhattan, NY System
Polar Research Outpost Alpha: 85°N 130°W
1900 Hours Local Time
VOICE ONLY

- - > "It seems like I'm making more log entries these days. I hope my paranoia is baseless, but today's discovery has shaken me to my bones. None of us really feel like doing any more research right now. Even Miguel is feeling the stress."

- - > "We took the cruiser out to the site from yesterday. The radio transponder's signal vanished around 1200 hours, so we went to investigate. When we arrived, the sight we were met with made me want to curl up in a corner and hug my knees. The ovoid bulge in the ice had grown substantially. Well, that's an understatement. It's grown by a magnitude. It's now half the size of a football field, and there are visible fractures in the ice. In one location, the white fluid is even oozing to the surface."

- - > "We performed a sonar survey under the ice, and discovered a massive network of spidery tunnels that stretch for at least five hundred meters in every direction. No telling how deep it is. We haven't done the numbers, but there's an unimaginable amount of this fluid under the ice here. In fact, judging from the growth of the stuff, I don't know what to do. Is this a disaster? It certainly seems so. I suggested to everyone when we got back that we report this immediately, but all I received were muted nods."

- - > "I'm going to go radio this in immediately. This has grown too serious for us to keep quiet anymore. We probably would have reported it sooner, but nobody imagined the severity of what we found. Thank god we discovered this when we did. I only hope it isn't too late."